Build your GTM from Scratch in 2025
An in-depth guide series to help early stage founders in GTM with proven Frameworks. A bit of a story and revival of Prodcircle
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Hello friend,
Happy New Year.
The course of this newsletter is changing, a little, or I should say, going back to the roots. For those who don’t know, I used to write this newsletter and got a lot of support from the community. (Wait for new branding please)
Not that you care but here is a sneak peek of the new design and website in progress. I’ll share more details soon.
So Why bring it back?
In the last few months, I have had the opportunity to work with a few AI companies. These companies are building AI infrastructure to power apps of the future. While I was working on their GTM / Growth, I learned a lot about the space in general.
There is fierce competition in the DevTool space. They are everywhere now, and some of my VC friends have already invested in these companies.
But, I looked at these companies from a different angle.
With the evolution of AI, I believe that building products will get easier—a lot easier. You do not need to hire a dev agency or build an extensive dev team to build the first version of your product. In most cases, this statement will hold up.
So, the problem will be distribution. For example, in the case of Hypermode, the company that I helped in GTM and launched their open-source model, Modus, almost ten companies are building the same tool or something eerily similar.
That means, whoever gets the messaging, positioning, and story right, will eventually dominate.
And that is why I left my somewhat comfy role there and started to double down on Prodcircle.
But enough of the sales pitch.
Housekeeping
I meet tons of founders and investors every week. And I feel that most of the founders are in one of these buckets. (please wait for the branding to get done so I can create cool images)
We will build a great product first and users will come automatically
We are building a great product but are unsure how to get the first 10 customers (b2B) or the first 100 users. (B2C)
We have got early traction but we are not seeing much growth.
You get the gist. It’s a long list.
So, this is part 1 of the series of building your GTM from scratch. Let me set some ground rules.
I hate lengthy, fluffy content so I will use a lot of bullets to convey the points.
I hate complex words and jargon. I’ll avoid all of these.
I’ll share my personal experience and amazing companies that have used some frameworks in the past.
I’m borrowing your time, I value that a lot. So, if you finish reading it every week, you should be able to make significant progress in your founder journey.
If you like it, you will share it. If you hate it, you will teach me something new.
Deal? Perfect!
This series will be divided into 10 editions. I’ll try my best to write weekly:
Edition 1: The Foundations of GTM. Hype vs. Reality → This Post
Edition 2: Defining Your ICP (Ideal Customer Profile)
Edition 3: Crafting a Winning Value Proposition
Edition 4: Channel Strategy: Picking the Right GTM Channels
Edition 5: Go-to-Market Motions
Edition 6: Building Your GTM Playbook
Edition 7: Pricing and Packaging for Success
Edition 8: Metrics That Matter
Edition 9: Scaling Your GTM Strategy
Edition 10: Real-World GTM Success Stories
Misconceptions about GTM
There is a lot of noise out there and finding the right advice is always hard. I’m not saying whatever I have to share is perfect but that is what I have implemented and it has worked - or I have learned it from people who have perfectly used it.
Misconceptions About GTM
We’ll focus on GTM after the launch.
Why: GTM should begin during product development. Understanding your target market, refining your positioning, and validating your messaging is critical before launching.
Only established startups need a GTM strategy.
Why: GTM is vital for startups at all stages, especially early-stage startups (Seed to Series A). It helps ensure you're building for the right audience and scaling effectively. Audience mismatch is a huge pain and solving from the get-go is the only approach you should consider.
GTM is just sales and marketing.
Why: GTM is a holistic framework encompassing product-market fit, customer acquisition, onboarding, retention, and feedback loops. It aligns your product, marketing, and sales strategies.
One GTM motion fits all.
Why: GTM motions must be tailored to the startup’s stage, industry, and audience. A SaaS startup targeting enterprises might focus on Account-Based Marketing (ABM), while a B2C SaaS might prioritize viral growth.
We should only focus on one GTM motion.
Why: First GTM motions are not scaleable. That is why you start with them. In the beginning, you do manual outreach or founder-led sales or content, etc. These motions are great for getting the first 10 or so customers. But, when you cross the validation stage, think about combining multiple GTM motions, such as inbound for lead generation, outbound for enterprise sales, and product-led growth for self-serve customers.
We should try more GTM motions.
Why: If you are early stage (Pre or Seed), please stick to one or two max GTM motions. Starting outbound, inbound, ABM, etc. is not helping you. Find 1-2 channels per motion and validate the idea, messaging, etc.
GTM ends when we reach product-market fit (PMF).
Why: GTM evolves as your startup scales. After PMF, GTM focuses on scaling efforts, refining messaging, and expanding into new markets.
We don’t need to invest in tools until later.
Why: Tools like HubSpot, Apollo.io, and Segment can streamline GTM efforts even for early-stage startups by automating processes and providing data insights. We are in the AI era. You should be focused on leveraging as much AI in automating repetitive tasks, as you can.
How you should think about GTM?
So, how should re-think about GTM efforts then? Here are some bullet points (you will hear me say that a lot):
When Should You Focus on GTM?
As soon as you have a Minimum Viable Product (MVP) or a prototype.
Before launch build pre-launch awareness and gather feedback. Distribution is everything
Continuously during scaling to adjust to market changes and audience insights.
Who Is Ready for GTM?
Startups with:
A clear understanding of their target audience and pain points.
An MVP with initial traction or feedback.
Some resources to invest in marketing, sales, or community-building efforts.
Founders are open to experimentation and feedback-driven iterations.
How Many Motions Should You Use?
Start with 1-2 motions based on your business model and target audience. For example:
Inbound + PLG for SaaS tools targeting self-serve models.
Outbound + ABM for B2B startups targeting enterprises.
Expand to more motions as you scale and diversify your audience or market channels.
Glossary
Before we go ahead, let me define these ‘fancy’ terms that are thrown around every day.
Product-Led Growth (PLG) vs. Sales-Led Growth (SLG)
Product-led: The product is self-serve (with a freemium (free plan) or trial offering), and users become customers after using the product on their own. Usually, sign up and get onboarded. They also generally discover your product through content (blog or Socials), ads, or word of mouth. This includes companies like Figma, Notion, and Riverside
Sales-led (SLG): The product requires someone from the company (usually a salesperson or Founder early on) to onboard the customer. The new customer generally tries the product only after a salesperson reaches out. This includes companies like Workday, Snowflake, and Salesforce.
Top-Down vs. Bottom-Up
Top-down: You go after leaders (e.g. execs, VPs, heads-of) within the organization, who buy and spread your product throughout the company top-down. This includes companies like Workday, Carta, and Square. Then you grow within the account.
Bottom-up: You target individual contributors within a company, who spread the product bottom-up, eventually enabling you to sell and expand the product companywide. This includes companies like Code, Neo4j, and Vercel.
Other terms
Sales assist: A sales team helps close and expand larger accounts that primarily come through a product-led motion (vs. outbound sales). I’ll explain this later when we get there but it’s different than Sales Led.
Bottom-up lead gen: A sales-led company with a self-serve product that is primarily designed to drive leads to the sales team (not generate revenue). The Sales team then gets on the call and closes the deal.
In-Depth GTM Motions
Here are most of the GTM Motions for B2B, B2C, and AI SaaS startups. You can add a few more to the list but then again these are either based on my experience or have been verified by hundreds of teams. (again, please wait for the branding to see cool branded images). I’ll explain all of these later in the series.
Inbound
Outbound
Paid Digital
Community
Partnership
Account Based Marketing
Product Led Growth
Events
Affiliate Marketing / Referral
Viral Growth
Thought Leadership (founder or the exec team)
Key GTM Pillars:
A strong GTM ensures that you’re solving for the right audience, scaling efficiently, and maintaining focus on what drives adoption and retention. Here are the 5 key pillars that I’m sure you have heard of before but again just laying down the foundation.
Audience: ICP, buyer personas, pain points.
Positioning: Differentiators, unique value proposition (UVP).
Messaging: Value delivery communicated in simple terms.
Channels: Inbound, outbound, community, etc.
Metrics: Success indicators like activation rate, MQL to SQL conversion, or retention.
Why you should read it?
Most founders (I’m not generalizing, I have a sample size of 30+) are building good products. Some are solving great problems, others aren’t but they are building a great business regardless.
2025 is the year where distribution > building. If you are building something orare involved in an early-stage startup, my goal is to help you solve your GTM and pipeline issues.
This week on Beyond the Hype show
We are in the AI Hype cycle. LLM models are peaking, old assumptions are not working, and we are not seeing much improvements in the models. Also, 2025 is the AI agent and Swarms of AI agent year. Please give it a watch.
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Thank you again for reading this. Please share it with your friends/colleagues if you like it.
M.